Shaman
The shaman is a hybrid class and depending on how players choose to customize their character's talents, they can specialize in offensive spellcasting, melee damage dealing, or healing. As such, the class is considered one of the most adaptable and versatile in the game. Shamans can also provide support to a group in the form of stationary totems, of which when placed on the ground by the shaman, either provides various benefits to party members, or deal damage to enemies, of which the range is determined by the totem placed. Background Shamans are spiritual visionaries of tribes and clans. These gifted warriors who can see into the world of spirits and communicate with creatures invisible to eyes of normal beings. They are beset by visions of the future and use their sight to guide their people through troubled times. Although the shaman may seem wise and serene at first glance, he is a formidable foe; when angered, his wrath is as fierce as those who have a connection to Eternals or nature.World of Warcraft: The Roleplaying Game, pg 71 History Shamanism has existed since the sapient races first discovered the power of the elements of Earth, Air, Fire, and Water. On Draenor, now shattered Outland, the orcs were shamanistic; on Azeroth, trolls and tauren were shamanistic. Though shamanism on Azeroth flourished and still continues to, shamanism on Draenor was all but extinct by the time of the great crossing of the Horde into Azeroth via the Dark Portal. The greatest and yet some of the most vilified orcs were once shaman; Zuluhed the Whacked, Ner'zhul, and even Gul'dan were all previously shaman. However, Kil'jaeden, current lord over the Burning Legion, distorted the shaman's connection with their spirits in the sacred mountain of Oshu'gun, himself taking on the form of the shaman's ancestors to convince the shaman (who held much political sway in the orcish culture) that the Draenei were the enemy. The ensuing massacres upon several Draenei hunting parties offended the spirits, who eventually denied the shaman their powers. All was set for the transition. Cut off from their elemental powers, the former shamans turned to the more efficient and masterful powers of the Burning Legion, becoming Warlocks. Though many tried to hang onto their roots, it was impossible. Even Drek'Thar was sucked into the dark magics, though he later repented and to this day has never forgiven himself for the acceptance of the demonic corruption that plagues himself and the orc race. Ner'zhul was the warlock who created the portals from Draenor to many other worlds. The many portals ripped Draenor apart creating the ravaged land of Outland. He repented but was dragged back into the fold by Kil'jaeden who promised him an endless existence of suffering and pain if he did not serve the Legion. Ner'zhul accepted this second chance at serving the Legion and was changed into the mighty being the Lich King and currently inhabits the body of Arthas Menethil his first and most powerful of the second generation of Death knights. Shamanism in the orcs was all but extinct until Thrall, the son of the deceased Durotan and future chieftain of the Frostwolf clan, grabbed hold of the reins of Warchief of the New Horde ushering in a new generation of shamanism, breaking the crippling lethargy of the captive orcs and outlawing the dark magic of the Burning Legion. At the time of the internment camps, a shaman was a derogatory term for someone who told fantastical and unbelievable stories.Lord of the Clans, pg 98 Shamanism is now in good repute, though, as the New Horde itself was led for a long time by Thrall, a shaman of great power. Overview The shaman class was originally only available to three of the Horde races: tauren, orcs, and trolls. Designed as a counterpart to the Paladin, the shaman class was once unavailable to the Alliance. This was said to create much trouble in developing both classes since they needed to be balanced against each other. The release of The Burning Crusade expansion introduced the shaman to the Alliance through the draenei while the Horde gained access to the blood elf Paladin, thus making it possible for both classes to be developed independent of each other. In parties, shamans make the quintessential fifth member; supplementing the others with powerful buffs (using their totems and shields) along with healing or damage on par with other, more specialized classes. Shamans have the ability to resurrect themselves once every 30 minutes (which can be reduced with talent points to once every 15 minutes) using their ability. In addition to its uses within a fight, this, in combination with their ability to resurrect other players, makes shamans a viable utility for wipe recovery. Originally, shamans were supposed to be capable of tanking through the enhancement talent tree.http://www.worldofwarcraft.com/info/underdev/shaman.html However, their lack of heavy plate armor and the various changes made to their talent trees over time have phased out their tanking potential in favor of healing and damage dealing. While most shamans are capable of adequately tanking instances prior to reaching level 60, higher level areas and instances require tanks to have stronger passive defenses and damage mitigation than shamans have, despite their versatility and healing abilities. Notable shamans Shaman organizations * Earthen Ring: A group of shamans employing all races connected to the elemental spirits, including orcs, taurens, trolls, mag'har, broken, lost ones, draenei and even a few of the Wildhammer dwarves. * Unnamed Draenei shaman brotherhood led by Farseer Nobundo. Races The shaman class can be played by the following races: Until The Burning Crusade, the shaman class was exclusive to Horde (Taurens, Orcs, and Trolls). In Burning Crusade, Draenei shamans were introduced to the Alliance. With Cataclysm, Alliance Dwarves also learned shamanism, while the Horde's new addition, Goblins. turned out to have shamans of their own. Each Race has its own distinct advantage, no matter its class; consequently, many players who wish to play shamans factor in the advantages and abilities of the various races when starting their characters. Some prefer tauren for their racial ability, as shamans themselves do not possess any ability to stun. Others prefer orcs as stun effects don't last as long when used against them, which is helpful versus a rogue, as well as against a shadow priest; likewise, the orcs' racial ability can be very useful for a shaman because they get a bonus to both their melee attacks and spell damage. Both of these abilities are very useful in PvP. Still others enjoy playing trolls because of their and powers, and the bonus which can allow them to level more quickly. Players looking for a boost in healing for PvE or PvP may find that the draenei's usable racial ability, is an effective heal over time spell that can be cast on oneself or on another player at no mana cost. In the end, the choice of race is up to the player, and often comes down to a matter of aesthetics more than anything else. As long as the player enjoys the race they have chosen, many will simply ignore the mathematics. Talent trees shaman]] Elemental The elemental tree focuses on the shaman's offensive spell casting ability. It decreases the mana cost and casting time of spells via talents while increasing their damage and critical strike chances. The 31 point talent ability is Elemental Mastery, a self buff usable every three minutes that gives you a 15% increase to haste that lasts for 15 seconds. The 41 point talent is Totem of Wrath, a totem which increases the raid's spell power, and makes any enemies in it's radius more likely to be critically hit. The 51 point talent, introduced in WotLK talent is Thunderstorm, a AOE spell around the shaman that both restores mana, and knocks all nearby enemies back. Overall, elemental is the best build for shamans who want to maximize their damage output with their spells. Enhancement By spending talent points in the Enhancement tree, a shaman greatly increases their melee damage output. Signature talents of this tree include Dual Wield, giving shamans the ability to dual wield 1H-Weapons, Lava Lash, an instant attack that deals more damage if the offhand weapon is enchanted with Flametongue Weapon, Stormstrike, which allows the shaman to hit with both weapons at once, also causing the target to take more nature damage from the shaman in the next 2 hits. Finally, their 51 point talent, Feral Spirit, enhancement shamans summons a pair of immensely powerful wolves which add a huge amount to the shaman's DPS while active, as well as healing the shaman with each strike. - Dual Wield is now, alongside Primal Wisdom and the new Mental Quickness, the new passive abilities when chosing this spec, with Lava Lash being the active ability. The new 31 point Talent Trees still have Feral Spirit as its final talent. Still the better spec to off-tank dungeons. Now, Enhancement Shamans can off-tank very well up to level 85 non-heroic dungeons, using the new tank-emulating weapon enchant, that reduces damage taken and increases the threat generated. The Heroic mode is still hard to off-tank for this class, but not impossible. Restoration The restoration tree focuses on the shaman's healing capability, reducing the casting time and mana cost of healing spells, while increasing their effectiveness. Restoration shamans are well suited for any healing situation in the game. On top of that they offer good utility (like Mana Regeneration by Mana Tide Totem), and the best multi-target heal spell in the game (Chain Heal), giving them excellent potential as raid-wide healers. The 41 point talent Earth Shield acts as a very mana-efficient single-target HoT with a long duration. The 51 point talent, Riptide give the shaman an instant cast heal and a HoT. This tree is highly useful in PvP and group PvE, the only drawback being the rather low damage output, so solo play is more difficult. In return, a restoration shaman hardly ever dies while questing/soloing. ;See also: :Shaman talents :Shaman builds Equipment Shamans can wear leather armor at the start of the game and can train to wear mail gear after level 40. It is not uncommon for many shamans take up leatherworking as a profession because there is some mail armor that can be made. Additionally, the Dragonscale Leatherworking specialization can make several mail armor items with stat bonuses that are very beneficial to the shaman class. Shamans can use one-handed maces with shields, staves, daggers, fist weapons, one-handed axes, and two-handed axes and maces by default. Post-patch 2.0, enhancement shamans can dual wield. After reaching level 40, a shaman can learn to wear mail armor from their trainer. For shaman casters, the Turtle Scale collection available from Leatherworkers is good, other items such as the Chain of the Scarlet Crusade are better for melee shamans. There are a number of end-game gear sets for shamans to use ranging from tier 1 to tier 10. There are also sets for PvP and all these sets can be found on the Shaman sets page. ;See also: :Enhancement gear BC :Wrath healing equipment (mail) :Shaman tactics Attributes See the main article Attributes. This breaks down specifically for shamans as follows http://forums.worldofwarcraft.com/thread.aspx?fn=wow-shaman&t=36420&tmp=1#post36420: * At level 70, it takes 40 agility to gain 1% to critical strike chance. * At level 70, it takes 22 critical strike rating to gain 1% to critical strike chance. * Your level's worth of agility will increase your chance to dodge by about 3% (e.g., +60 agility will give a level 60 shaman +3% to dodge). * Every point of agility provides 1 melee attack power (e.g., +70 agility will give any shaman +70 AP). ** This means that every 14 agility provides 1 additional damage per second (e.g., +140 agility will give any shaman +10 DPS). * Every point of strength provides 1 melee attack power (e.g., +70 strength will give any shaman +70 AP). ** This means that every 14 strength provides 1 additional damage per second (e.g., +140 strength will give any shaman +10 DPS). * Every point of strength increases the amount of damage you block with a shield. * Every point of intellect adds 15 mana (MP). * Your level's worth of intellect will increase your chance to crit with spells by about 1% (e.g., +60 intellect will give a level 60 shaman +1% to crit with spells; at level 70 it takes +70 int.) * Every point of stamina adds 10 health (HP). * Every 10 points of spirit regenerates 1 mana per second. This can also be described as "five spirit yields 1 mana per tick" or "2 spirit restores 1 mana per five seconds" (MP5). See also Formulas:Mana Regen. * Every 18 spirit increases health regeneration by 1 health per second (i.e., 9 spirit restores 1 point of health per tick). * As of patch 3.0 every point of Intellect provides 1 attack power with the talent Mental Dexterity (e.g., +70 intellect will give the shaman +70 AP) Abilities Totems Totems are unique to the shaman, and must be obtained by completing certain quests. Each Totem corresponds with one of four element (Earth, Fire, Water, Wind) and only one of each elemental type can be used at a time. Once a totem is put down, it cannot be moved, but a new totem can always be summoned to replace it. With the spell Totemic Recall (available at level 30), shamans can instantly remove all of their totems for no mana and receive 25% of the mana spent on the totems back. However, as of 2.4, shamans who have not yet reached level 30 (and therefore have not yet trained the spell 'Totemic Recall') will see "Totem Timers" below their character portraits. As with buffs, a simple right-click to the "Totem Timer" icon, and the totem will be destroyed with no mana gain. * See the shaman totems page for complete list of totems, and additional details. Spells Shaman spells include direct damage spells, heals, and weapon buffs among others. Their spells are mostly based on the elements. Talents Shaman talents are split into 3 categories: * Elemental — improvements in offensive spells and offensive totems. * Enhancement — improvements in melee related skills and enhancement totems. * Restoration — improvements in healing and restoration totems. Talent builders can be found at Official Blizzard site, WoW Den's Talent Calculator, WorldofWar.se, WoW Vault, ThottBot, Merciless, Wowhead. Shaman also are graced with , a second hearthstone which sits on a seperate cooldown that is half as long as a traditional Hearthstone. Weapons * Maces (1-handed) * Staves (2-handed) * Shields (off-hand) * Daggers (1-handed) * Fist Weapons (1-handed) * Axes (1-handed) * Maces (2-handed) * Axes (2-handed) Two Handed Maces and Axes were originally a 10-point talent (Two-handed Axes and Maces) for Enhancement, but became proficiencies Talent-based enhancements *Offhand weapons ("Dual Wielding") Cannot use *Swords (1-handed or 2-handed) *Polearms *Ranged weapons (wands, bows, throwing weapons, crossbows, guns) '' Note: the inability of shamans to use ranged weapons makes the Troll's Throwing Weapon Specialization and Bow Specialization racial traits worthless for them.'' End-game expectations Totems are a major part of the end game and knowing what totems will benefit the shaman's group members best in different situations is all part of the strategy involved in playing a shaman. With the versatility that comes with a shaman you will always be the one patching up on various issues that your group might run into. If your party runs into an encounter which is very DPS heavy, you will find yourself supporting DPS, occasionally throwing in a heal if needed. The same goes for encounters that require lots of healing. A shaman's role in parties and raids will vary depending on how they choose to spend their talent points and equip themselves, as some of the shaman's versatility is diminished if they focus heavily on one tree. For example, a shaman who has specced enhancement (and geared accordingly) may have problems healing, due to the lack of crucial intellect/+healing/MP5 bonuses on their gear which restoration requires, but will greatly enhance melee group DPS in raids (enhancing warriors, rogues, and feral druids via Windfury Totem, and all physical damage classes via Unleashed Rage and Strength of Earth Totem). On the other hand a restoration shaman gets very little benefit from going melee due to the lack of +hit/+attack power, whereas elemental shamans can cast ranged DPS and still cast the occasional support heal (and possibly main heal any 5-man instance), still getting the bonuses (in most cases) from +heal/+spell damage. Specialization is all a matter of preference. Some shamans choose to go restoration, some elemental, and others enhancement. No matter which tree they follow, there are a lot of abilities that will benefit raid/party DPS, protection and healing. Patch 2.0 (just prior to Burning Crusade) added such talents as Totem of Wrath, and Unleashed Rage (depending on whatever you wish to go Melee or Caster shaman), so although you may not be the number one DPS class or number one healing class, your choice of playstyle and talents will greatly benefit the classes who do heavy DPS and/or heals, leading to an overall successful achievement in the end. * Remember that the beauty of the shaman is its versatility, and even though you tend to go one way with talents, remember that you still have access to the rest of your spells and abilities. Wrath of the Lich King Changes ;Itemization Shamans now receive one point of attack power from both strength and agility. Additionally, every point of intellect provides one attack power with the talent Mental Dexterity. Also, critical rating and spell critical rating, as well as hit rating and spell hit rating, have each been condensed into a single stat. ;Totems Totems have been "condensed" into a smaller amount of totems, for example Grace of Air Totem was removed and its agility bonus was merged into Strength of Earth Totem. Totems were moved to physical school and cannot be counterspelled. Most totems now also affect raid members, not just the local party. ;Weapon enchants A new weapon enchantment has been added, Earthliving Weapon. It increases the healing power of the shaman. Flametongue Weapon now gives spell damage bonus to the shaman. The effect of the Windfury Totem is not a weapon enchant anymore and has been changed to a buff granting melee haste. ;Hex Shamans were given Hex, a polymorph spell with a 45 second cooldown allowing them to turn an enemy into a frog. The enemy cannot cast or attack but is still in control of his character. It will last up to 10 seconds on PvP targets with diminishing returns, similar to other crowd control, or up to 30 seconds on monsters. ;Unleashed Rage Unleashed Rage affects the raid, not just the party. ;Wind Shear Shamans now have Wind Shear, a threat-reducing spell that does no damage but has an interrupt effect.It is not affected by the global cooldown and, as of patch 3.2, no longer shares a cooldown with Shock spells. ;Water Shield Water Shield got moved to an earlier level and has more ranks now. ;Lava Burst The Lava Burst spell was added at level 75 in the elemental tree. ;Earth Shock As of patch 3.2 the Earth Shock spell was changed from interrupting spellcasting for 2 seconds, to increasing time between attacks by 10% for 8 seconds. Cataclysm changes General preview (available at level 3): Primal Strike is a new weapon-based attack that every shaman will learn very early in the game. Our goal with this ability is to make leveling as Enhancement rather than as Elemental more viable, since many key Enhancement talents become available at fairly high levels. (level 4): While the shaman already has an ability called Healing Wave, we're adding another spell to the class's direct-healing arsenal and giving it a familiar name. The current Healing Wave will be renamed , and the intent is for the 'new" Healing Wave to be the shaman's go-to heal. and Greater Healing Wave will be used on a more situational basis. (level 81): Unleashes the power of your weapon enchants for additional effects (see below). A dual-wielding Enhancement shaman will activate the effects of both of their weapon enchants. Instant cast. 30-yard range. 15-second cooldown. Undispellable. Here are a few examples of effects we're considering for this ability: * – Hurls a spectral version of your weapon at a target, dealing 50% weapon damage and increasing the shaman's Haste for the next five swings. * – Deals instant Fire damage and buffs the shaman's next Fire attack by 20%. * – Heals the target slightly and buffs the shaman's next healing spell by 20%. (level 83): An area-effect heal-over-time (HoT) spell that calls down rain in a selected area, healing all players within it. There is no limit to the number of players who can potentially be affected; however, there are diminishing returns when healing a large number of targets, much like the diminishing returns associated with AoE damage spells. This should give Restoration shaman another healing tool that improves their group-healing and heal-over-time capabilities. 2-second cast time. 30-yard range. 10-second duration. 10-second cooldown. (level 85): When this self-targeted buff is active, your spells are no longer interrupted by movement and possibly even by your own attacks. This will give shaman of all three specs another way to heal or do damage when it's necessary to move in both PvE and PvP. Instant cast. 10-second duration. 2-minute cooldown. Changes to Abilities and Mechanics In addition to adding new spells, we're planning to make changes to some of the other abilities and mechanics you're familiar with. This list and the summary of talent changes below it are by no means comprehensive, but they should give you a good sense of what we intend for each spec. * Restoration shaman and other healing classes will need to pay attention to mana more than they've had to during Wrath of the Lich King. Spirit will be the Restoration shaman's primary mana-regeneration stat. * We're making changes to which classes and specs are able to dispel magic, diseases, curses, and poison, largely for PvP purposes. Shaman will have as a baseline ability, but it will only remove curses. Restoration shaman will have a talent that will improve Cleanse Spirit so that it also removes magic. Shaman will no longer be able to remove poison. * will be removed from the game, as we want dispels to be a decision for players, not something done mindlessly. To that end, all dispels will cost slightly more mana, and you will waste the spell if you cast it when there is nothing to remove. (Currently, the dispel is only cast when there is something to remove, which encourages spamming 'just in case.") We will balance PvE dispelling with this new model in mind. * now will replace for all shaman, and dropping this totem will buff the group's spell power by 4%. Elemental shaman will have a talent that lets all Fire totems provide +10% spell power, allowing them to drop , , or s without losing their spell-damage buff. The 4% and 10% buffs will be exclusive with each other and with the warlock's , so you can't benefit from all of them at once. We're also considering letting Elemental drop Searing Totem at range. * We want to free up Enhancement global cooldowns to make the spec more dynamic to play. We're considering, for example, increasing the cooldown of so shaman have time to work other interesting abilities into their rotation. New Talents and Talent Changes * will be simplified so shaman have a more consistent spell range. * We plan to add as a deep Elemental talent for targeted and persistent AoE. * will likely be worked back into deep Restoration in some form. The idea is that you will be able to link targets together so they share damage. When we had previously tried to implement Spirit Link, it was hard to balance and a little confusing. However, we really liked the concept -- and so did players -- so we are trying to bring it back. * Elemental will have a deep talent that allows Spirit (which will appear on the gear they share with Restoration shaman) to boost their Hit rating. * will boost mana pool size, not Intellect. * will be replaced with , which will improve the damage of the new spell and . * With the Mastery system, we're also considering removing a number of talents that grant passive bonuses, such as , , , , , , , and others, to allow players more freedom to choose more interesting talents. Mastery Passive Talent Tree Bonuses ;Elemental #Spell damage #Spell Crit #Elemental Overload: Your direct-damage spells have a chance to proc a less powerful 'bonus" version of the spell. This will work much like the current Lightning Overload talent, but would also apply to Lava Burst. ;Enhancement #Melee damage #Melee Haste #Nature Damage: This will provide a passive bonus to the Nature damage dealt by the Enhancement shaman. ;Restoration #Healing #Meditation: The amount of mana you regenerate in combat as a function of your Spirit. #Deep Healing: Your direct heals will do more healing when the target's health is lower. This will scale to damage (e.g. someone at 29% health would receive more healing than someone at 30%) rather than have arbitrary break points. Also of note, you only get one set of passive talent tree bonuses: the tree in which you’ve spent the most points. Sub-speccing in another tree will not net you those bonuses in addition. Last but not least, it's the intention of Primal Strike to let shaman play as an Enhancement at low levels. Currently when leveling in this spec, you end up just using Lightning Bolt a lot so you feel like an Elemental shaman instead. At a higher level, Primal Strike gets replaced by Storm Strike. They share a cooldown so Enhancement just won’t ever use Primal Strike after that, in the same way that Prot warriors don’t use Sunder Armor once they have Devastate or Feral druids don’t use Claw once they get Mangle. We hope you enjoyed this preview, and we're looking forward to hearing your thoughts and feedback on these additions and changes. Please keep in mind that this information represents a work in progress and is subject to change as development on Cataclysm continues. | link = http://forums.worldofwarcraft.com/thread.html?topicId=24038611737&sid=1 }} Q&A ? :The Cataclysm is a time of great upheaval. Deathwing’s return to Azeroth tore a hole in the fabric of the universe that tragically resulted in the ultimate and irrevocable destruction of all Sentry Totems. Level designers are contemplating a shrine for the Sentry Totem near that of Uther the Lightbringer. We know shaman players will greet this news with grief, but as with all class changes we’ll have to get into beta before anything is final. ;Please make the "nature damage" for the enhance tree "elemental damage" so our bonus for putting points in isn't only affecting our nature damage. :We actually went with Nature damage for that reason. We thought all Elemental damage might end up just feeling like “damage.”; Since Nature damage is only a portion of your damage, choosing between an item with say haste versus mastery (i.e. Nature damage) might be more interesting. With a lot of mastery, you might actually favor other talents or different spell rotations. All of this just theoretical at this point and the passive talent tree bonuses are likely to see much iteration in beta. }} Note The shaman (prestige class) was replaced with the shaman (core class) in the World of Warcraft RPG.World of Warcraft: The Roleplaying Game Conversion Document, 1-2 Videos See also * See Shamanism and nature worship to learn more about the shamans' beliefs. * See List of shamans for named shamans from lore and in-game. * Spell power coefficient. * A list of useful macros for shamans. References External Links : : da:Shaman it:Sciamano pl:Shaman Category:Shamans Category:Core classes Category:WoW classes Category:World of Warcraft: The Roleplaying Game